Chase Briscoe doesn’t feel comfortable.

“I’ve never brought a single dime to any race team, so really, all I can bring is myself,” he told ESPN. “If you’re not performing, and all you can bring is your helmet, it makes it really easy for them to go in another direction. It’s why you have to perform and show your worth. Yeah, we’ve been fortunate enough to do that this year, but I’ve always felt my back is against the wall, and that’s what’s always driven me.”

The comments, especially now that Briscoe has won two races for Joe Gibbs Racing and appears to be a legitimate NASCAR Cup Series championship contender, are not so much surprising as much as they are unwarranted. Those two wins have established Briscoe as the driver of the No. 19 Bass Pro Shops Toyota and have shown that he and crew chief James Small, who are only in their first season together, are building a great partnership.

Briscoe not only led all Cup Series playoff drivers with the most points scored in the first round of the postseason (133), but led the entire series in points earned in those three races. He had the second-most stage points earned (30) to Bubba Wallace (35). And he led 451 of the 1,107 laps in those races.

Feeling like he is replaceable is emblematic of who Briscoe is as a driver. Perhaps it stems from sleeping on the couches of friends for so long early in his career, or it could come from having long believed that he needed race teams more than they needed him. After winning the first race in the first round of the postseason, though, Briscoe is now coming around to the idea that he’s a valuable asset.

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“I always feel like I’m auditioning, still, every week to a certain extent,” he said. “I certainly feel way more comfortable now having multiple wins, but this is still a dog-eat-dog world and you have to perform. I could very easily be running badly right now and on the chopping block. You have to perform at this level.”

Briscoe was hired to inherit the car driven by Martin Truex Jr., a former series champion and likely first-ballot NASCAR Hall of Famer. Briscoe had won two races in his Cup Series career (spanning 144 races across four seasons) before joining the Gibbs fold. While those in the industry have never doubted his talent, the 2025 season is the first time he’s had all the resources required for on-track success.

The good news is that Briscoe has always felt he’s performed better in higher-pressure situations. Not only on the racetrack, but in life.

It’s how he views his ride with Joe Gibbs, and he came into it feeling he still has something to prove in the Cup Series. The same could be said for Small, who wants to demonstrate that he can guide the No. 19 team to success without Truex, who was given much of the credit. Whether one considers it the team’s driving force or added motivation, it has worked to everyone’s advantage.

“We both had, I felt like, a lot of people doubting us,” Briscoe said. “‘Why are they in that role?’ James got a lot of flak for how he and [Truex] would go back and forth [on the radio], and now, knowing James, I’ve never met someone more competitive and more determined to win and willing to do what it takes to win. It’s been good because we both kind of have that chip on our shoulder; we want to prove we belong.

“I think James has certainly proven this year that he is an elite-level crew chief and that’s fun for me to see his progression. We’re living this together, and at Pocono, you saw how for both of us the weight of the world was lifted off our shoulders. Then, when we did what we did at Darlington (sweeping the stages and winning the race after leading 309 of 367 laps), it’s like a whole new level of confidence we’ve both reached at the same time together, which is fun. The race team has, too.”

And yet, perhaps because of that uncomfortable feeling Briscoe lives with, he isn’t quite ready to say the success he’s having means he’s arrived as a Cup Series driver.

“I’m torn, but I think you have to have a sense of that,” he said. “I don’t think you can ever say, ‘Oh, yeah, man, I’ve made it.’ But in the same sense, I’ve certainly made it. I never in a million years thought I would race a single Cup Series race. I never thought I’d run a Truck Series race. Now, to have four Cup Series wins, yeah, I’ve certainly made it from that standpoint.

“But with how my career has progressed, you honestly keep changing the goal posts. It went from, ‘I want to make it to Cup.’ Then you make it to Cup and then it’s, ‘I want to win in Cup.’ Well, you win in Cup and now you move the goalposts [again]. So, I don’t know. I’ve made it in very many ways, but I feel like I still have a lot more that I want to do.”

One of those things would be another Round of 8 appearance, if not more. Briscoe believes it’s expected as a Joe Gibbs Racing driver to at least make it that far into the postseason. From there, if Briscoe were to advance all the way to the Championship 4, it would be the first time he’s accomplished such a feat.

It’s been a season of firsts, though. In his first year in a Gibbs car, Briscoe has won multiple races for the first time in a single season, has eclipsed the most laps led, top-five and top-ten finishes he’s ever earned in a single season, and has led the point standings for the very first time.

The next first on the list would be a berth in the Championship 4. Of course, the icing on the cake would be if Briscoe were to cap off this season of firsts with his first NASCAR Cup Series championship.